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Xevious
Xevious is a vertically scrolling shoot-em-up released in 1983 by Namco. It is the first game in the Xevious series. Though it was commercially unsuccessful in North America and Europe, it was hugely successful in Japan, spawning books, the first video game soundtrack and a short film. Gameplay The player controls the Solvalou, a spaceship that flies to Earth to prevent an alien invasion by an army called Xevious. The Solvalou has two methods of attack: a laser cannon that fires two shots in front of the ship and a bomb that can be dropped. Depending on the enemy, they will either be vulnerable to the laser cannon or the bombs. The bombs can also uncover secrets, including the Sol Citadels that awards the player with points. The special flags from Namco's Rally-X can also be collected for points (or extends, depending on the DIP switch settings.) The secrets are indicated by the bomb targeting system going red over a seemingly blank space. Xevious is one of the first shoot-em-ups to feature a rank system, where the enemy AI adjusts based on the player's performance: If the player performs well, enemies will become faster and more aggressive, with certain enemy types being phased out as they destroy more of them. The player can choose to reset rank by destroying red towers on the ground.. Xevious has 16 areas, many of which end with a fight against the "Andor Genesis" mothership. This fight requires the use of both the laser cannon and the bomb. The cannon destroys the laser blasters on the ship while the bomb damages the core. After beating the 16th area, the game loops indefinitely. If the player dies towards the end of an area, the game will respawn them at the start of the next area. The game is noted for its visual design. Rather than taking place in space like many contemporary shooters, Xevious takes place on Earth and features forests, deserts and lakes in the background. Most famously, the player can fly over the Nazca lines, which would become integral to the Xevious mythos. Development Xevious was designed by an internal Namco team as a direct competitor to Konami's Scramble. Initially, the game was titled Cheyenne and was set during the Vietnam War. In this iteration, the player's ship was an Apache helicopter. The Cheyenne ''idea was scrapped when Masanobu Endō became the design leader. Endō wanted to create a game with a realistic universe. He went as far as creating an alien language called "Xevian." The game's striking visuals were accomplished by utilizing shades of gray, giving more color depth to the sprites. The game title was initially "Zevious," but the team found the X to be more mysterious. Ports Atari, Inc. acquired the North American arcade and home rights to Xevious in 1983. Xevious was one of the few arcade exclusive games to receive television advertisements at the time, with the taglines "Are you devious enough to play Xevious?" and "the Atari game you can't play at home." In actuality, Atari planned to port the game to the Atari 2600, 5200, Atari 8-bit computers and the upcoming 7800. A version of the 2600 port can be seen in a 1984 Atari marketing video, but afterwards, the project was restarted with Tod Frye as the lead programmer. This version was nearly complete, but was cancelled in 1984 due to Atari's financial situation. A near-complete version has been leaked to the internet. The 5200 version was to be developed by Jim Huether and Alan Murphy and like the 2600 version, was nearly complete. However, according to Huether, he had been in conflict with the Atari executives for quite a while and he finally reached his breaking point and left the company when executives insisted that he delay Xevious to turn it into a game based on ''Dune. This prototype has also been leaked. The 8-bit computer version has not been leaked, but it is rumored to have been identical to the 5200 version, as was common at the time. The Atari 7800 port was delayed along with the system itself until May 1986 when it was finally released. This version was done by General Computer Corporation. This version is reasonably faithful to the arcade version, albeit lacking the rank system. Furthermore, the cannon and bomb are mapped to the same button, despite the 7800 having two buttons. The first and most famous port of Xevious is the Famicom/NES version, released in 1984 in Japan by Namco and 1987 in North America by Bandai. This version was one of the first hugely popular games for the Famicom, with the initial printing selling out in three days. This version is very faithful to the arcade version and retains the rank system. The NES version is nearly as prolific as the arcade version itself and has seen many re-releases of its own, including as an unlockable in Star Fox: Assault for the GameCube, the Classic NES Series for Game Boy Advance, the Wii and Wii U Virtual Console, and on the My Arcade Galaga Pocket Player and AtGames Bandai Namco Flashback Blast. Other contemporary ports were released on Apple II, Commodore 64, PC-8801mkII, PC-9801, Fujitsu FM-7, Sharp MZ-700 (as Tiny Xevious,) Sharp MZ-2500, Sharp X68000, Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum. Compile released an enhanced MSX2 version called Xevious: Fardraut Densetsu (not to be confused with the PC Engine title of the same name.) The arcade version of Xevious has seen many re-releases, including on the defunct GameTap service, the defunct Wii Virtual Console, Xbox Live Arcade and a 3D version for Nintendo 3DS.. = Category:Arcade Category:Games Category:Namco [[Category:Vertically Scrollin